The Apology

Think me not unkind and rude,

That I walk alone in grove and glen;

I go to the god of the wood

To fetch his word to men.

Tax not my sloth that I

Fold my arms beside the brook;

Each cloud that floated in the sky

Writes a letter in my book.

Chide me not, laborious band,

For the idle flowers I brought;

Every aster in my hand

Goes home loaded with a thought.

There was never mystery,

But ’tis figured in the flowers,

Was never secret history

But birds tell it in the bowers.

One harvest from thy field

Homeward brought the oxen strong;

A second crop thine acres yield,

Which I gather in a song.

   –Ralph Waldo Emerson

Figues of Speech:

Alliteration:

That   I walk alone in grove and glen – g

I   go to the god of the wood – g

Fold   my arms beside the brook – b

For the idle flowers I brought – f

But   ’tis figured in the flowers – f

But   birds tell it in   the bowers – b

One   harvest from thy field – f

Personification:

Each   cloud that floated in the sky

Writes a letter in my book

For   the idle flowers I brought

Every   aster in my hand

Goes home loaded with a thought

But   birds tell it in the bowers

Homeward   brought the oxen   strong

Rhyme Scheme

abab – Rood, wood; glen, men; I, sky;   brook, book; band, hand; brought, thought; mystery, history; flowers, bowers;   field, yield; strong, song;